smiling too sweetly
by zedille
Summary: If nothing else, Svetlana is an actress: the first meeting with Anatoly and Florence in Bangkok.


This was written in 2010 (!) and posted on my now mostly defunct livejournal. I still plan on coming back to this someday, but since that seems unlikely to be anytime soon, I figured I'd dust it off and post it again. (Though, you know, the best way to get me back in a fandom is to talk to me about it...)

This fic borrows from the Broadway/American post- _You and I_ conversation, as well as the pre- _I Know Him So Well_ conversation with Florence, and basically serves as a shorthand to my original revisionist Svetlana headcanons, which were an attempt to reconcile all the different portrayals of Svetlana across the London and American productions. In (very) short, Svetlana was actively working behind the scenes of Act II to make Anatoly come home, and she's not above using her skills as a (professional) actress, or her children, to manipulate everyone. Two years pass between Act 1 and Act 2 (basic London 2-match outline). Svetlana and Anatoly have two children: a son, Andrei, now 14; and a daughter, Yekaterina, now 7. Yekaterina came along with Svetlana to Bangkok while Andrei stayed home, insurance against Svetlana defecting too.

Subtlety, what subtlety?

 _Thanks for reading! — Dec 19 2016_

* * *

Yekaterina is curled up in her mother's lap, playing with some flowers as Svetlana croons to her under her breath and braids her hair, combing it and smoothing it out before twisting and pinning it.

It seems a perfectly normal scene between a mother and her young daughter out for an afternoon at the Bangkok Flower Gardens, which is as it should be, given the amount of effort Molokov put into arranging it. There are cameramen borrowed from de Courcey hidden behind the hibiscus, waiting for the last two players of their pathetic little drama to arrive. Svetlana knows Molokov has somehow managed to get de Courcey to work with them; he is leading then into the flower gardens now, where they will oh-so-conveniently run into her, and later he will arrange to have all this broadcast. Her poor husband will soon be suffering something of a public relations crisis.

Sure enough, Svetlana hears voices in the distance, drawing ever closer. They are speaking in English, but she can pick out Anatoly, a woman — Florence Vassy, she supposes — and another American, who must be de Courcey. Yekaterina does not seem to have noticed, or if she has, her father's voice has not registered.

"Katyusha, who do you think that is?" she asks, following the script they've decided on. Yekaterina looks up and shrugs indifferently — why should she care about some other people in the flower gardens?

"Why don't you take a look? Go, shoo. A growing girl like you needs more exercise." Svetlana shoves gently at the girl sprawled in her lap; to her credit, Yekaterina does not complain at the suggestion, despite her shyness, and obediently stands up before wandering off into the flower paths in the opposite direction from the approaching party. She soon disappears from sight among the taller rose trees.

Good. Svetlana only has to worry about her own appearances, now. She hates to use her daughter as a pawn in these games—she doubts Yekaterina fully understands the consequences of the situation-but it has to be done. Leaving a wife is one thing, but what kind of man would desert his five-year-old daughter? (What kind of woman would manipulate her, she does not think.)

The voices get louder as the speakers come closer to where she's sitting. Svetlana stares down at her fingers, loosely clasped in her lap, the very picture of a heartbroken woman finally letting her shields down now that she's alone. If nothing else, she is an actress, and this is her most important role yet.

 _Everything_ depends on her performance now.

* * *

They are in the middle of a conversation about roses when they enter the clearing where she sits. Svetlana raises her head wearily and jerks back when she sees who it is standing there, eyes wide. Anatoly's reaction isn't much better; he breaks off mid-sentence to stare at his wife. Vassy and de Courcey look over as he stops talking abruptly, and turn from one silent figure to another in morbid fascination.

The silence stretches on for a few infinitely long moments, as Anatoly and Svetlana stare at each other. Neither wants to be the first to break the silence and acknowledge the other; the tension in the air increases until even the hidden cameramen must feel awkward and voyeuristic.

"I… hello, Anatoly," says Svetlana finally, careful to add enough of an accent to her English. Her voice shakes before she manages to get it under control and (mostly) remove the quaver. "It has… it has been a long time."

Anatoly nods silently and does not say anything.

Evidently it will be up to her to move this little farce along. She takes a long, rattling breath. "Yekaterina!" she calls, returning to Russian. "Katya, your father is here! Come quickly!"

Within a few moments, their daughter has arrived at a run. "Daddy!" she screams, and runs over to hug him. Anatoly stares at her blankly for a moment before smiling and bending down to receive her, picking her up and swingng her around. "Katya, how you've grown!" he exclaims good-humoredly. "My god, I won't be able to pick you up any more!"

"I missed you!" says Yekaterina, clinging tightly to her father. "Daddy, Daddy, I missed you—" She buries her face in his shoulder and rocks back and forth; Anatoly stiffens and turns away.

Svetlana pauses for a moment to let him agonize before stepping in. She stands up wearily. "I apologize for that," she says (a lie. That was perfect.) "Yekaterina, you mustn't pester your father now. He's very busy with his games."

Katya picks up on the unspoken cue and gestures that she wants to be let down. Anatoly sets her back on the ground. not without a measure of relief, and she returns to Svetlana's side, suddenly shy as she notices Vassy and de Courcey standing off to the side. They may not speak Russian, but they should have managed to follow the gist of the conversation.

"I'll leave you to it," says de Courcey hurriedly, drawing all eyes to him as he walks off past Vassy. She is left standing alone a little ways off, an intruder into the touching Sergievsky reunion scene.

De Courcey, Svetlana notes, is quite good at what he does.

The three of them — husband, wife, and mistress — are left standing there, the three points of a twisted triangle, with Yekaterina still hiding behind Svetlana's skirt. Vassy and Anatoly exchange looks, which Svetlana pretends not to notice, keeping her eyes on Anatoly. Let the adulterer consort with his mistress; she is the abandoned wife, the wronged one, innocent in this whole affair, and she will not sink to their level.

Anatoly breaks the silence just before it would have become awkward. "Svetlana," he says, turning to her — good, at least he still has the decency to acknowledge her first — "Svetlana, this is Florence Vassy, my… my second."

Is she really, thinks Svetlana. It was only two years ago that she was Trumper's. How times have changed.

She forces herself to smile (one of her best smiles, just the right mix of strain and grief hidden behind a mask of determined politeness). "Miss Vassy. Of course I have seen you in the arena with Anatoly."

Svetlana has to resist the temptation to add a bit of edge to her voice, to load that neutral statement with meaning; it would be so easy—but no, this isn't a soap opera, and once it descends to one, then she loses her advantage.

Vassy smiles uncertainly as Anatoly turns to her. "And Florence, this is Svetlana. My… my wife."

Both of them wince as Anatoly says the word _wife_ , though they try to hide it. Still, proprieties must be acknowledged, and Svetlana is indeed his wife, wish though they might that she weren't.

"It's a pleasure to meet you," says Vassy automatically. A moment later she seems to realize who it is she's actually talking to. "I'd heard you were here, but…" she murmurs, and then trails off vaguely, casting about for another topic of conversation. She finds it in Yekaterina, still mostly hidden where she's standing behind Svetlana's leg.

"And is this your daughter?" Vassy asks to no one in particular, bending down and gesturing for Yekaterina to come forward. "Goodness, but she's adorable—" Vassy's voice dies away as Yekaterina, somewhat reluctantly, reveals herself fully, and she looks at Anatoly guiltily, almost accusingly. Svetlana knows why: with her long hair braided down in two long plaits, her huge eyes staring upward, and her hand still clinging to the material of Svetlana's skirt, Yekaterina looks very young, very innocent, and very vulnerable. And this is the Yekaterina of now; what would she have been like two years ago when Anatoly defected?

"She does not speak English," says Svetlana apologetically.

"Oh, no, I wouldn't imagine that she would — how old is she?" asks Vassy, still trying to maintain a safe conversation, still trying to keep the little scene going.

This time, however, Vassy has stepped right into the trap. Svetlana twists her coldly satisfied smile into the softer one of a proud, loving mother. "She just turned seven," she says fondly: "I'm very proud of her, she's been very brave these last two years without her father."

Vassy does not look like she has heard the second part of Svetlana's statement; once she hears that Yekaterina is seven — _seven_ — she pales, and looks at Anatoly again. There's definitely a hint of accusation and anger there now; what, did Anatoly never tell her just how old his children were? Even if he did, it must be a shock to actually see just how young his daughter really is; Svetlana doubts that their relationship will ever fully recover.

After all, Vassy now knows that Anatoly willingly abandoned a five-year-old girl for her sake.

"I'm sorry," Vassy stammers, looking from Yekaterina to Svetlana to Anatoly and back to Yekaterina again. "I — I'd better go." She turns and leaves along the same path that de Courcey had taken earlier; Svetlana hopes that the cameramen have the sense to get out of the way before Vassy sees them. It wouldn't do to tip their hand and reveal de Courcey's change of heart this early.

And then, finally, they are alone, the broken Sergievsky family, husband and wife and daughter, together for the first time in two years.


End file.
